The Last Chicken in America: A Novel in Stories [Hardcover]

Ellen Litman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 17, 2007

Twelve linked, wryly humorous stories about an unforgettable cast of Russian-Jewish immigrants trying to assimilate in a new world.

Masha is just out of high school when her family arrives in Squirrel Hill, Pittsburgh. With touching lightheartedness and tremendous humor, these stories trace her struggles and those of other Russians in the community to find their own place in the new society—seniors alienated from their children, spouses trying to hold their families together while grappling with unemployment and depression, young adults searching for love. In "Dancers" a pair of hedonistic and financially unstable performers invades the home of a married couple. The hero of "The Trajectory of Frying Pans" falls for a coworker who may or may not be trapped in a green-card marriage. In "About Kamyshinskiy" a man, living under the scrutiny of his daughters and neighbors, is trying to start over after the death of his wife. This is an impressive debut about the sometimes painful, sometimes hilarious collision of cultures, religions, and generations in contemporary America.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Russian immigrants settle in Pittsburgh and attempt to assimilate in this linked set from Litman, who emigrated from Moscow in 1992. Masha, a lonely dreamer, is a vulnerable teen desperate to distinguish herself from the other Russians in town. As she struggles to help her obstinate parents settle down, she finds comfort in Alick, a friendly exchange student from Moscow who gives Masha her first lesson in love. Subsequent stories introduce a plethora of characters: Tanya, a repressed housewife, longs to escape her loveless marriage, while single mother Natasha has a set of friends who insist on setting her up, and widower Kamyshinskiy attempts to start over. Throughout, Litman deploys a style that's a perfect mix of sophistication and bewilderment, as her often highly educated characters cope with various forms of underemployment, with American buoyancy and with their own sometimes suffocating subculture. While Masha is a focal point, each of the stories has its own arc, and the community never comes into focus as a whole. The result is less like a novel than a coherent set of mostly first-person character studies by a very promising writer. (Sept.)
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From Bookmarks Magazine

Having emigrated from Moscow as a teenager in 1992, Ellen Litman has lived the life she so vividly describes in her debut, and she adroitly depicts the stress, underemployment, isolation, and sense of loss commonly suffered by new immigrants. Though English is her second language, Litman’s writing style is graceful and clever. She paints a colorful portrait of a vibrant community, and Masha makes a charming, observant narrator whose subtle appreciation of the ironies of the American Dream provides a cohesive filament throughout the book. A few of the stories read "less like fiction than like notes for a longer work" (New York Times Book Review), but critics unanimously praised this collection of fresh and engaging stories from a promising new writer.
Copyright © 2004 Phillips & Nelson Media, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; First Edition edition (September 17, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393065111
• ISBN-13: 978-0393065114
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 6.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (21 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,443,455 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Much more than just another "immigrant book", September 24, 2007

By 

Jane Roper (Boston, MA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Last Chicken in America: A Novel in Stories (Hardcover)

It's ironic that one reviewer here complained that the subjects of the stories in this collection aren't unique to immigrant life, since that very fact is one of the book's strengths: 'The Last Chicken' may be about a very specific immigrant community, but its stories explore themes that are universal to the human experience -- love, death, marriage, aging, jealousy, illness, struggle, joy. This, along with Litman's beautifully clean prose, subtle humor and empathy for her characters, is why the "The Last Chicken" is such a satisfying read.

To the Squirrel Hill residents who have come to vent their anger here: I hate to be the one to break it to you, but the fact that you find Litman's stories to be such an accurate depiction of the realities of your lives is the best possible endorsement you could give the book.

Naturally Litman has drawn on real people and situations to create her characters and stories; all fiction writers do. Ironically, the fictionalized portraits she has painted of Squirrel Hill's residents in her book are far more subtle and sympathetic than the portraits they've painted of their (non-fictional) selves here.

11 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars hilarious, moving & uplifting, September 15, 2007

By 

Kendra Deganhardt "KJD" (Brooklyn, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Last Chicken in America: A Novel in Stories (Hardcover)

"The Last Chicken," is the best novel-in-stories I've read in years. Like her fellow immigrant-authors Jhumpa Lahiri, Amy Tan and Gary Shteyngart, Ellen Litman first and foremost tells a great story. When I read the stories in "The Last Chicken," I feel like I'm in Squirrel Hill, along with the characters, in their houses, eating the various Russian foods, having breakfast conversations over scratchy wooden tables. I worried for the people in the town. I wanted the men to win their wives back, to convince the IRS not to arrest them, to get the promotion they'd been scheming after; and for the women to finally meet a decent guy. The book immersed me in a different world--as cliched as it sounds, I feel like I learned something about another culture. The stories are so funny, smart, and wry, that they're worth reading again and again. And the visceral descriptions and the close perspective--the way the book subtly allows us to know what the characters are thinking and feeling--is masterful.
I'm not sure what that other reviewer was talking about. I thought the characters were smart, funny, and hot. I'd be flattered to be one of them. And who knows whether the book's "fiction" or not? Isn't it all "fiction?"

9 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars America through the eyes of outsiders, September 15, 2007

By 

D. Baker "Beezlebub" - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Last Chicken in America: A Novel in Stories (Hardcover)

I thought I'd add my two cents worth. This is a wonderful little
collection of short stories, that accurately capture aspects of both
American life, as well as the rather quirky middle class concerns of a
little Pittsburgh Russian community.

I'd recommend this to anyone who's interested in American society as
seen through the eyes of outsiders, which is what many of these
characters are, in various ways. They're clearly American through and
through, yet they bring their unique cultural and philosophical
concerns with them, as baggage.

And its fascinating to see US society through the lens of these quite
accurately drawn characters, as they go about their daily lives, and
try to make sense of both their own existences, as well as the all
encompassing landscape of modern America.
Litman brings a cool and analytical eye to bear on US society, almost
accidentally, as her stories unfold - which makes it doubly fascinating
to read.

On a side note, disregard the quite hysterical review by the otherwise
charmingly-named 'fluffy' - who sounds like someone with an agenda.
Normal and sane book reviewers don't use words like 'defamation' and
'smearing' or 'self hatred' - unless there's some sort of weird personal
agenda at work. Who knows? Who cares. The book is great reading,
and has no hatred or negativity that I could see. If anything, there's
clearly a deep compassion for her quite fascinating characters,
who're struggling to make decent and happy lives for themselves,
in the often odd world of modern America.

I'd highly recommend this book, as it captures some interesting parts
of a sub-culture, and an American-immigrant reality, that most of us will
never see. Very nice work.